Relaxing into Heart

Andrea Jackson
Radiant Awareness Teacher

How many times have you heard come from your heart, be in your heart, share from heart? Yet, do you really ever experience your heart directly? Do you actually feel another's heart? Or are you like most... wondering at this point if the heart is a real place at all.

We were part of a culture that taught being selfless was the spiritual way to be. Mother Teresa considered a saint was the epitome of a woman who sacrificed her life for others. Yet, at the end of her life Time Magazine revealed her deep anguish and torment during her service to humanity.

Now we are part of a collective moving into embracing the Self. Coming from more of what we truly are.

So, how does the heart fit into all this?

The heart can lead us to acts of selflessness, awareness of Self and even selfishness, depending on what is needing integration.

There seems to be a rebalancing on our planet. I am seeing many who were quite selfish suffering in ways that are opening their hearts causing them to give more freely and I and many other healers, teachers and service peoples are learning to receive without hesitation.

In each moment, there is available awareness of the heart. From this, one can express in the ways that would lend itself to be the most loving. This includes tough love, clear boundaries, saying no, as well as blissful openness, innocence and oneness, sweet loving gestures...hugs, kisses and caresses and of course it includes ecstatic joyful sexuality and communing with community. We can naturally experience and express all of this in one day from our heart. There is no limit to the experiences we can have and create from our heart.

Awakening in the heart is a profound sense of source originating from within. This arises as a result of focused awareness on one's heart and learning to mediate life with the heart more and more fully open and available.

Usually an emotional crisis such as a love break up, accident, significant illness will causing such painful constrictions in the heart that we must pay attention. At this point many run from this pain rather than seeing the golden opportunity to breakthrough the heart ache fully. This is our greatest most reliable source of freedom. There is nothing...no medicine, no escape that will free one, only staying with it, breathing through it, saying yes this is me too!!!

Then the door to the heart breaks open and we are awake to all of what we are...the good, the bad, the ugly. The spiritual, the selfish, the critical, the foolish are all integral parts of our wholeness. Forgive yourself, love yourself, relax into all of what you are and you will find the most exquisite surprise...freedom.

If you would like a truly loving facilitator, please don't hesitate to call or refer me to anyone who is suffering. The results are truly extraordinary! I'm here to facilitate and celebrate your joyful awakening!

Andrea
303-545-5485
www.RadiantAwareness.com

A Global Celebration

It’s time we move from spiritual practice and ceremony to human participation and celebration. Our planet is awakening in ways that are calling us to be here more fully. This is not about getting anything right, but rather about dancing, singing, laughing, saying what we need to say and thoroughly participating in each others’ presence. This authenticity is our greatest gift and lends itself to a more global celebration of our humanity.

There is also a need for rolling up our sleeves and participating in what needs to be done. Let’s pitch in and show support for all the efforts being made now to bring our world to its current point of liberation. This must start in our own homes, schools and communities and move outward from this more grounded, centered orientation. Let us now say and do what would create the greatest contribution in each and every interaction.

A Present Love

Love is a vague, overused word. What if instead of saying I love you, we shared authentically from our hearts. It might sound like…I really appreciate how you make such a special effort to cook dinner or I really enjoy how you can laugh at things most people would be disappointed in or it’s great how focused you are on your homework. Feel into how it would be to receive personal affirmations like these. Would you feel seen and met more fully?
What if at work places, grocery stores, with the mailman, at parks and everywhere we acknowledged each other in these beautiful, specific ways. What if we allowed our hearts to spontaneously lead the way in each interaction, showing us how to truly love one another? The hearts simple wisdom urges us all home to the natural enfoldment of oneness. The heart is the gateway to truly understanding who we are and the profound nature of our innate interconnectedness. I recently wrote a song with the line ‘Love knows no bounds’ expressing this eternal interconnected expansiveness that we are.
What if within the knowledge of your soul there lies a secret code that finally brings you completely home to your natural self? Rest, joyous expression, peaceful awareness, and divine stillness would become your companions. You would finally realize that you are the magnificence you have been seeking. Your absence from yourself or disconnection is what has caused you to be consistently dissatisfied with all your attempts to ease your life’s struggles.
My simple suggestion is to love you all the way home. It is the quick route. Love yourself and others by specifically recognizing what is most appreciated each moment. Be present in specific ways for yourself, your children, your sweet pets, your grocer, your community, your world. This is a present love which will continually invite your heart to lead the way and your soul to show you the magnificence that you truly are. What an unbeatable combo.

Breathing to the Core

For many years I've heard spiritual clichés about opening ones heart and about being mindless. It's like a fad to catch onto the latest spiritual buzz words and self identify with them.
But... are we truly willing to pause and listen to the rhythms of our heart?
Do you know what your heart feels like when you are hurting, when you are vulnerable, when you are softly open to all that is?
Do you genuinely feel into your heart and breathe with the tightness, the blocks, the constrictions?
Do you offer loving kindness to these subtle shifts and changes that fluctuate within?

Do you honor yourself in these ways?

Or do you just say your heart is open, you're present and continue to play out painful duality games?

Do you know what it feels like to have a beautifully sensitive open heart that is willing to continue to open, tenaciously, so that you and those around can benefit from your authentic nature. Is it easier to be tough, to have a protective shell over the heart, to open and close based on ego agendas or are you truly willing to risk feeling all that is present.

Waking up is being aware sensitively, nakedly, authentically, not just conveniently in all this human experiencing. For now it is for the pioneers, the brave and perhaps at some point for everyone. There is never a lack of opportunity to be present to this.
We avoid this out of a fear of pain. Breaking through pain means being with the core, or root of what is arising. This is true breakthrough.
Finding ways to ease, or escape the pain is more like cutting the top off the dandelion, you can be assured it will return, pretty quickly, even stronger than before. Then you will need more of whatever your 'escape of choice' is.

Presence brought to the pain equals breakthrough it's really that simple. If it's complicated it's because the mind is running a repetitive story about it. Pause, drop the story and breathe through waht is arisingf. What's left, what's always left...presence.

Celebrating your awakening;

Andrea

Oh Sweet Spring...how you tease my senses

Warm wind blowing through my hair, sunshine radiant on my bare arms, hints of vibrant green splashed about...as I ascend the extremely steep goat trail leading up the back way to Mt Sanitas; I huffed and puffed, breathed through inertia and welcomed all the pain and strain. I tromped and plodded through mud and light snow and hardened soil, legs aching, winded, yet I knew I would love the result. New life was imminent.
Afterwards, true to my premonition, I felt strong, full, victorious; like I was alive again, following a long, lethargic winter.
I wonder if this is what each small grass and flower, each new growth must endure. Moving through dark hardened soils, small cracks revealing subtle streams of light and then at last the tingling warmth of the sun and the sweet company of other life forms.
Slowly, even now, spring is arising from the earth, a small patch of green grass appears within melting snow mounds, buds appearing on my lilac bushes. She is already beginning to whisper of this new life, of newfound love and of sweet new ways.
Her dazzling colors and sweet perfumes will soon be meandering through the old wintery haze, mesmerizing us all into a delightful spring fever.
Are you ready for her wondrous ways to awaken your senses and delight you with newfound love?
Are you ready for that spring cleaning that makes way for new adventurous ways of being?
Are you ready to clean out the old beliefs closet to make way for your magnificent wardrobe?
Are you ready to release the heavy emotional baggage that feels like an old winter coat and put on those great hiking shorts or fun slinky dress?
Isn't it time to live your new life now?
Open now to the joys of your eternal/internal spring

Breakthrough Your Core

For many years I've heard spiritual cliches about opening ones heart and about being mindfull. At times it seems like a fad to catch onto the latest spiritual buzz words and self identify with them.

But, I've been listening a bit more deeply lately and hearing some haunting questions...
Are we able to pause and listen to the rhythms of our heart?
Do you feel your heart when you are hurting, when you are vulnerable, when you are softly open to all that is?
Do you genuinely feel into your heart and breathe with the tightness, the blocks, the constrictions?
Do you offer loving kindness to these subtle or significant shifts and changes that fluctuate within?
Do you honor yourself in these ways?

Or do you just say your heart is open, you're present and continue to play out painful duality games?

Are you willing to expereince the authentic beauty of your sensitive open heart, even if it means you will feel more of everything....including pain?
Are you willing to continue to open, tenaciously, so that you and those around can benefit from your authentic loving nature?
Or is it easier to be tough, to have a protective shell over the heart, to open and close based on ego agendas?
Are you truly willing to risk feeling into all that is present?
Waking up is being aware sensitively, nakedly, authentically, not just conveniently. This asks for tremendous courage. As we evolve and awaken this will become the norm, for now there are trailblazers to look to.

Most still avoid this out of a fear of pain, or a constriction, holding onto the pain. This is suffering. Breaking through pain means being with the core, or root of what is arising. This is true breakthrough.

Finding ways to ease, or escape the pain is more like cutting the top off the dandelion, you can be assured it will return, pretty quickly, even stronger than before. Then you will need more of whatever your 'escape of choice' is.

Presence brought to the pain equals breakthrough it's really that simple. Why carry those old pains any longer. If it's complicated it's because the mind is running a repetitive story about it. Pause, drop the story and breathe through what is arising. What's left, what's always left...presence.

I'm here to bring you quickly through core pain and
celebrate your awakening!
Andrea
www.RadiantAwareness.com